NONLINEAR MODEL-BASED STARTUP AND OPERATION CONTROL OF A DISTILLATIONCOLUMN - AN EXPERIMENTAL-STUDY

A nonlinear model-based control law has been derived within the global ly; linearizing control structure in a differential geometric setting, and it has been applied for the startup and operation control of a pi lot plant distillation column. The control algorithm is computationall y inexpensive and has been implemented by using a personal computer vi a the RS232C standard interface. Experimental results confirm that the proposed algorithm allows fast column startup as well as effective di sturbance rejection and servo operation without the need of further co ntroller tuning when switching from startup control to operation contr ol. The superior performance of the proposed control algorithm over a conventional linear controller has been experimentally shown to result from the presence of the model term in the control law.